Tesuji

By Simon Scott

In Tesuji Simon Scott takes the aesthetic simplicity of the board game of Go and spins it into a display of strange, seemingly supernatural ability. Entering into a couple of games of simple chance, the performer demonstrates that not only can he influence the outcome, but with a minimal amount of training, a participant from the audience can do the same too.

This release is a complete revision of Simon Scott's chapter in Liber Mentis.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Jun 4, 2014
• ISBN: 9781291901399

Book preview

Tesuji

Tesuji

noun - a term used in the game of go, or shogi, to denote a clever play, a skilful move.

First Edition

Copyright (c) 2014 Simon Scott

All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-291-90139-9

acknowledgements

This project simply wouldn’t exist without the inspiration and, indeed, the permission of John Bannon so to him I am truly grateful. Buy all his stuff.

Thanks also must be paid to Iain Dunford, Steven Drury, Madelon Hoedt, Todd Landman, Phill Smith, Jon Thompson, and Paul Voodini.

Final thanks must go to Ig, though, who puts up with me better than all others.

introduction

The performer drops two cloth bags onto the table, and asks his participant to empty them out. As this is done, the performer pulls a stack of written cards from his pocket, and takes one at random. Pocketing the rest, he proceeds to read the card to himself, before placing it, folded, on the table.

He proposes a game. The contents of the bags, a collection of black and white glass pebbles, are mixed. The participant divides them up roughly equally between the bags. This done, the participant selects a colour, black or white. Each player draws a stone one at a time from the bag. If they match, they are placed in front of the relevant player - two black stones and they go in front of the black player, two white stones and they go in front of the white player.

Once both bags have been exhausted the stones are counted up. The participant has won by two stones. The participant is invited to read out the card. It states that the performer will lose by two stones.

The performer